By Krishna Kripa Das
(Week 22: May 28–June 3, 2026)
Baltimore and New York City
(Sent from New York City on June 6, 2026)
During the twenty-second week of 2026, spent the first three days in Baltimore, promoting the Ratha-yatra for two days and attending it on the third.
The next day and a half I spent at Stuyvesant Falls, taking care of the deities of my guru, Satsvarupa Dasa Goswami. The day and a half after that, I returned to ISKCON New York in Brooklyn where I lived and chanted with their NYC Harinam party for three hours on Monday and Tuesday. Wednesday I returned to Stuyvesant Falls, to take care of my guru’s deities. I also attended the Chatham Wednesday program there.
I share quotes from Srila Prabhupada’s Srimad-Bhagavatam as well as a lecture of his on that book. I share a powerful realiztion by Srila Prabhupada’s guru, Bhaktsiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. I share quotes from Vaishnava Compassion and The Letters Project, Volume 2 by Satsvarupa Dasa Goswami. I share notes on classes by Svayam Bhagavan Keshava Swami and by Nitai Pada Kamala Prabhu.
Many thanks to Baladeva Vidyabhusana Prabhu for the use of the car to commute between Hudson train station and Stuyvesant Falls. Many thanks to Anuttama Prabhu for the photos of me at the Baltimore Ratha-yatra.
Itinerary
May 4–June 15: NYC Harinam
– May 30: Baltimore Ratha-yatra
– June 7: Schenectady 60-hour kirtan
– June 13: New York Ratha-yatra
June 16–August 13: Paris harinama
– June 20: Antwerp Ratha-yatra
– June 28: Paris Ratha-yatra
– July 2–3: Liverpool harinama
– July 4: Liverpool Ratha-yatra
– July 5: Birmingham Ratha-yatra
– August 14: Amsterdam harinama
– August 15: Amsterdam Ratha-yatra
– August 16: Rotterdam harinama
Chanting Hare Krishna in Baltimore
I had come to Baltimore two days before the Ratha-yatra on at least two other occasions. My experience is different every time. In most every temple, the managers think they are too busy to have a harinama the day before or even two days before the festival. Still such last minute advertising is valuable because it reaches tourists who recently came into town and it reminds people who may have heard about the festival earlier or who may remember it from last year that it is happening that weekend. I always meet people who express gratitude that I told them about the festival, and I often meet people who attend the festival because they met me, and thus I continue to try to promote Ratha-yatras by doing harinama the day before or two days before although they are not often well attended.
On Thursday I chanted by myself for three hours, and I invited people to the festival, showing them on my phone the poster I had downloaded from the temple Facebook page. On Friday I was joined by Bharat, who I had met originally when he worked in Tallahassee and who had come out with me to promote Baltimore Ratha-yatra the previous year. We took turns singing and telling people about festival for three hours.
Here Vishnugada Prabhu, who I remember leading midday harinama in New York when I first lived in the temple back in 1979, chants Hare Krishna at beginning of the Baltimore Ratha-yatra (https://youtu.be/c1eN6fFiQqs):
It was wonderful to see how different people were attracted to watch the procession.
I came upon this woman smiling broadly as she made a video of the kirtan and the procession and tried to sing along. She was from Ottawa, and I told her about the upcoming Montreal and Toronto Ratha-yatras, and hour and half and four hours away from her, respectively. I also gave her the details for ISKCON Ottawa. She said, “Namaste!” as I left.
This woman was fortunate enough to get a garland from the Ratha-yatra cart.
This young woman dances while eating her ice cream as she gazes at the colorful procession and hears the joyous kirtan (https://youtube.com/shorts/ZVURQqpV5FY?feature=share):
Two young women, one with her drink in one hand and her phone in another, enjoyed dancing with the devotee women in the Ratha-yatra procession for at least ten minutes.
You can see them in the following video.
Devotees chant Hare Krishna as Baltimore Ratha-yatra proceeds along the waterfront at Inner Harbor (https://youtube.com/shorts/oGi1JjRHTC0):
During the Baltimore Ratha-yatra at least a couple of devotees happily distributed invitations for the upcoming New York Ratha-yatra.
Isha Ray chants Hare Krishna at the end of the Baltimore Ratha-yatra (https://youtube.com/shorts/Lyc5SaZvQuQ):
After the procession, I invited people who were attracted to the stage show, the prasadam, and the exhibits to the Sunday program at ISKCON Baltimore in Catonsville.
Lord Jagannatha stayed at the festival site on a simple altar to a little after 4 p.m. People would fan the deities with camara and peacock fan.
Afterwards the people would receive Jagannatha prasadam.
Svayam Bhagavan Keshava Maharaja must have spent at least three hours at the Q & A booth there. After he left, I had five minutes before my bus to New York.
One woman came up asking about her next step in her spiritual journey. I explained just by hearing the chanting of the kirtan, she had taken the next step. I encouraged her to chant japa on the beads she had received, gradually increasing in the course of time, and to attend the Sunday program in Catonsville.
Chanting Hare Krishna in New York City
Nitai Pada Kamala Prabhu chants Hare Krishna in Manhattan (https://youtube.com/shorts/xkdA0n5HpO4?feature=share):
While he chanted Hare Krishna, a guy played shakers and danced (https://youtube.com/shorts/MxcQ9Rwazs8):
Haridas chants Hare Krishna in Manhattan (https://youtube.com/shorts/wBld2WBOemM?feature=share):
Maha-mantra Prabhu chants Hare Krishna in Manhattan, and two people play shakers and dance (https://youtube.com/shorts/2STiEjdz_LM?feature=share):
Ranchor Prabhu chants Hare Krishna in Manhattan (https://youtube.com/shorts/lSkSYz7iiug?feature=share):
Madhurya Rasa Devi Dasi chants Hare Krishna in Manhattan (https://youtube.com/shorts/OMdNIPWo1jU?feature=share):
When I invited this gentleman to the New York Ratha-yatra, he told me, “I was the chauffeur of Srila Prabhupada for two weeks in Boston in 1968.” He explained that the devotees did not have a vehicle. He belonged to another yoga group, and they asked him if he could take Srila Prabhupada around Boston when he visited and he agreed. I told him I had a friend who likes to interview people who met Srila Prabhupada, and he kindly gave me his card. He lives in Copenhagen and was flying out that night. He was accompanied by his daughter who lives in New York but does not share an interest in yoga.
Later the same day that I met the man who was Srila Prabhupada’s chauffeur in Boston in 1968, I met the woman who was his nurse in New York in 1967. I had met her a few years ago at Washington Square Park, also while promoting Ratha-yatra. Satyaraja Prabhu said I should have got her contact information so he could interview her, so this time I asked her for that, but she was reluctant to give it to me. I proposed making video of her, but she said she didn’t look good. I suggested we could make an audio recording, but she said her voice didn’t sound good. I said we could make a transcript of the recording and not share the recording itself with others. That she agreed to.
KKD: So you were at Beth Israel from ’64 to ’67. What was your first meeting with him [Srila Prabhupada].
Nurse: Well, he was my patient. I was a student nurse. He was in a bed. That’s why I don’t want to talk because it’s private.
KKD: Oh, yeah, yeah. No worries.
Nurse: But my impression was he was very respectful, kind, and gentle, and he had a lot of people. He was a beloved man, and his followers would come in to want to massage him. But he had a situation . . . I didn’t know if they should . . . Whadayaknow? Maybe it did him more good. Alright.
KKD: Thank you. Thank you for taking care of him. Would you like the free cookies we are giving out?
Nurse: No, I just ate stuff, but they look great.
KKD: They are packaged so you could keep them for later.
Nurse: I just came from uptown. I had gelato. I could give it to somebody. Alright.
This guy belonged to another group claiming some allegiance to the Vedic knowledge.
This guy had a new “karma button,” which I had never seen before.
Fortunately by hearing the chanting of Hare Krishna, his karmic situation improved.
Chanting Hare Krishna in Upstate New York
My guru’s pujari was out of town, so I was engaged in dressing his Radha-Govinda deities twice a week. I took the train to Hudson on Sunday morning, helped with the deity worship Sunday and Monday, and then returned to New York City do to harinama on Monday and Tuesday. Then Wednesday morning I returned to Stuyvesant Falls to do the deity worship again for two more days. Wednesday is the day of the Chatham program, so I got to chant Hare Krishna there, as did three other kirtan leaders, and I also brought some prasadam. In addition, I would chant Hare Krishna at the Hudson train station with my harmonium for a few minutes each time, both coming and going, for the benefit of the passengers, their drivers, the employees, and the cab drivers out front.
Insights
Srila Prabhupada:
From Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.9.7, purport:
“The next question is why people are against such auspicious activities as chanting and hearing the glories and pastimes of the Lord, which can bring total freedom from the cares and anxieties of material existence. The only answer to this question is that they are unfortunate because of supernatural control due to their offensive activities performed simply for the sake of sense gratification. The Lord’s pure devotees, however, take compassion upon such unfortunate persons and, in a missionary spirit, try to persuade them into the line of devotional service. Only by the grace of pure devotees can such unfortunate men be elevated to the position of transcendental service.”
From a lecture on Srimad-Bhagavatam 7.6.3 in Montreal on June 16, 1968:
Saradiya: I want to know, when we serve Krishna, do we have spiritual senses, then that satisfies our spiritual senses when we serve Krishna in Krishnaloka?
Prabhupada: Yes. You dance with Krishna, you eat with Krishna, you talk with Krishna, you enjoy with Krishna. Krishna will kiss you also. [laughter] Krishna is very kind to everyone, either you love Him as a lover, either you love Him as your son, either you love Him as your friend, or you love Him as your master. In whichever way you like you can love, and Krishna will respond.
Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura:
From a lecture:
“The world is in no need of any reformer. The world has a very competent person for guiding its minutest happenings. The person who finds that there is scope for reform of the world himself stands in need of reform. The world goes on in its own perfect way. No person can deflect it by the breadth of a hair from the course chalked out for it by providence. . . . What is necessary is to change our outlook to this very world. . . . The scriptures declare that it is only necessary to listen with an open mind to the name of Krishna from the lips of a bona fide devotee. As soon as Krishna enters the listening ear, He clears up the vision of the listener so that he no longer has any ambition of ever-acting the part of a reformer of any other person, because he finds that nobody is left without the very highest guidance. It is therefore his own reform by the grace of God, whose supreme necessity and nature he is increasingly able to realize by the eternally continuing mercy of the Supreme Lord.”
Satsvarupa Dasa Goswami:
From Vaishnava Compassion:
“Vaishnava prayer is the begging for the heart of bhakti and then the willingness to let that flow move out toward others in some form or other.”
“My mother first taught me to pray for others, but Srila Prabhupada taught me what to pray for.”
“We are not always capable of liberating all the fools and rascals, but we are capable of praying for them.”
“Even if all we appear to accomplish in a life of prayer is to be a little bit kinder to the living entities around us, that is no small feat.”
“One who leads a contemplative life finds that all his activities are prayer, if not explicitly stated, then implicitly lived.”
“A contemplative life also allows us to see not just our differences but our similarities with the nondevotees—to see our anarthas and especially our selfishness. Seeing those parts of ourselves will allow us to become humble enough to pray.”
From The Letters Project, Volume 2:
“Remembrance of Srila Prabhupada is my sadhana, and I have executed this in my many books about Prabhupada, led by the Srila Prabhupada-lilamṛta.”
[To Kadamba Kanana Maharaja:] “You are a perfect example to me, and I often think of you in this regard.”
Svayam Bhagavan Keshava Swami:
From a Monday evening class:
The materialists use technology or fantasy to create a paradise because they do not believe in a spiritual world.
When I was distributing books once, a woman said to me, “Don’t stop me because I am a nihilist.”
All Vedic philosophies deal with jiva (the soul), prakrti (the material nature), and brahman (the supreme spirit).
The devotees do not try to enjoy the material world, do not try to deny the world, and do not try to escape from the world. They engage with the material world.
Once I pitched a tent in a field, and the rats were bothering me, and I was upset, “Why are these rats intruding on me?” Then it occurred to me, “Actually I am actually intruding on them.”
Four issues for the future:
Anthropocine
DeepFake
Virtual Disconnection
Apocalypse
The average person spends 8 hours on a device each day, and we wonder why people are lonely.
Loneliness is more dangerous to health than smoking 15 cigarettes.
Extreme intolerance and unimaginable power are a recipe for disaster.
Spiritual people come together and enlighten one another.
The only hope for the world is communities where the human-divine connection is nourished.
When you take God out of the world, people will do all kinds of misdeeds to achieve their ends.
Peace is the remembrance of the divine in every situation.
Our purity is our immunity from the complexity of materiality.
Comment by someone: I feel like I am running.
If you go out in the morning and change one person’s world, that is significant.
Martin Luther King, Jr. said that the people who want to make peace in the world have to be as intelligent and organized as those making war.
Jayananda Prabhu said, “When I reflect on my consciousness had I not had association with devotees and Srila Prabhupada, I shudder to imagine the nightmare I would be in. If we could become a little dedicated to distributing the mercy, so many could be saved so much suffering.”
I have been to many cities, and New York is a monster.
Srila Prabhupada had to have such conviction to keep his focus on his truth that he knew could save the world in the monster city of New York.
We need to know what people are struggling with so we can present our solution in a way that they can assimilate it.
Videos that go viral deal with these three issues:
What is my purpose?
How can I find love?
How can I have better mental health?
The Bhagavad-gita deals with all three of those issues in a deep way.
Einstein said you’ll know the truth because it is simple and beautiful.
Nitai Pada Kamalam Prabhu:
As a kid I had occasion to visit relatives who were not devotees. They would enjoy through intoxication. In the beginning, it looked like they were having a good time. But soon things seemed to disintegrate, the place became smelly, and the result was unpalatable for me. However, when I went on the Slovenian padayatra the enjoyment we experienced had no unpalatable side effects.
The higher taste is getting fully absorbed in Krishna consciousness.
Gopa Kumar traveled throughout the universe, but by the grace of his Gopal mantra, no place in the material universe was completely satisfying to him.
Krishna will catch us, but we have to let go and allow Him to catch us. Otherwise we will never experience it.
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This verse reminds us that it is important that our acts of devotion to the Supreme Lord are supported by the different scriptures through which He reveals His will. We cannot just do whatever we feel like doing and expect that God is necessarily pleased by it.
sruti-smrti-puranadi-
aikantiki harer bhaktir
utpatayaiva kalpate
“Devotional service of the Lord that ignores the authorized Vedic literatures like the Upanisads, Puranas and Narada Pañcaratra is simply an unnecessary disturbance in society.” (Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.2.101, quoted from Brahma-yamala)
